August 18, 2014

Ocracoke Lighthouse

Hello from beautiful North Carolina! I’ve been here since August 12th, initially for a medical appointment at Duke University Medical Center with an orthopedic foot and ankle specialist/surgeon. The appointment was a huge let-down, to put it mildly. But I’m glad that I decided to extend my stay and make a holiday of this trip. I’ve been staying on an incredible little island called Ocracoke, which is part of North Carolina’s Outer Banks since last Friday night. I really lucked out in choosing this place, as well as the cute and charming B&B I randomly found online. I’ve been so impressed with the island, the village, the B&B, the beaches. Everything.

You can read more about my Duke and NC experience in the post I recently wrote for RheumatoidArthritis.net:

Tomorrow is my last full day here and I’m sad thinking about it. I’m not ready to go back home! I love the ocean so much and I have to say that island life certainly agrees with me. Alone time is something that I’ve been severely lacking for several months; I didn’t realize how much I needed this vacation.

July 22, 2014

I’m not sure what week/day I’m on except that I went down to 7 mg at the start of this week. HOORAY! I WILL reach 0 soon. Staying at 0 is the main goal, though, and that tends to be tricky.

Milligram by milligram I will get off of this drug. Then the next hurdle–tapering off the Xanax and Vicodin. I’m not looking forward to that. I’m actually really nervous of withdrawal/tolerance side effects, but I know I can do it.

July 19, 2014

Acupuncture Day 2 (in a row):

Large-ish, very noticeable bruise on my forehead after today’s needle stabbing. How attractive. I hope this works soon.

Why can’t insurance pay for massage treatments? That would be more pleasant and equally beneficial for my chronic pain, I’d argue. I actually quite like getting acupuncture treatments, but massage therapy would feel so much better.

In other “alternative” news, I already failed my gluten-free “diet.” Big surprise there, eh? My anxiety is through the roof again and my tension headaches are on screaming fire. So, while this stuff is going on, I’ve found it a bit challenging to stick to my new gluten-free goals. Also my no-caffeine goals. AND my no-alcohol goals. Whatever. You can’t change the world at once, right? But I have little patience and I hate taking baby steps. I will get back on the “wagon” ASAP though with all of this stuff once my head decides to stop exploding.

Maybe I need to start meditating (do I have the patience and focus to do that?). Speaking of that, based on a strong recommendation from one of my pain management doctors, I recently bought a book by Jon Kabat-Zinn: Full Catastrophe Living. I’ll let you know what I think.

July 16, 2014

Good, exciting things are starting to happen just recently! But I’m going to leave it at that until things are confirmed. One of those good things I will say right now is that I’m down to taking 10 mg of prednisone. I’ve been SLOWLY tapering down from 30 mg since April. This makes me very happy and I hope I can continue tapering each week until I’m off of this dreadful medication.

Hooray, 10 mg! Sometimes it’s slowly, step by step, that things get better. And I always must keep reminding myself of this, especially during those times when it feels like nothing will be better again.

July 10, 2014

So I’ve been M.I.A. on here for quite awhile, as you might have noticed. Unfortunately I’ve been dealing with all kinds of exhausting craziness: RA flare-up, additional health problems/illnesses, family stress. BUT! I’m finally feeling better and that I’m ready to get back to working on my writing and photography work (among other projects and things).